ant once or twice
when he was hoeing his turnips, and passed the time of day and
landlord's wife wore her new brooch to church every Sunday. But we
didn't mix much with the ghosts at any time, all except an idiot lad
there was in the village, and he didn't know the difference between a
man and a ghost, poor innocent! On Jubilee day, however, somebody told
Captain Roberts why the church bells were ringing, and he hoisted a
flag and fired off his guns like a loyal Englishman. 'T is true the guns
were shotted, and one of the round shot knocked a hole in Farmer
Johnstone's barn, but nobody thought much of that in such a season of
rejoicing.

It wasn't till our celebrations were over that we noticed that anything
was wrong in Fairfield. 'T was shoemaker who told me first about it one
morning at the Fox and Grapes. "You know my great-great-uncle?" he said
to me.

"You mean Joshua, the quiet lad?" I answered, knowing him well.

"Quiet!" said shoemaker, indignantly. "Quiet you call him, coming home
at three o'clock every morning as drunk as a magistrate and waking up
the whole house with his noise!"

"Why, it can't be Joshua," I said, for I knew him for one of the most
respectable young ghosts in the village.

"Joshua it is," said shoemaker; "and one of these nights he'll find
himself out in the street if he isn't careful."

This kind of talk shocked me, I can tell you, for I don't like to hear a
man abusing his own family, and I could hardly believe that a steady
youngster like Joshua had taken to drink. But just then in came butcher
Aylwin in such a temper that he could hardly drink his beer. "The young
puppy! The young puppy!" he kept on saying, and it was some time before
shoemaker and I found out that he was talking about his ancestor that
fell at Senlac.

"Drink?" said shoemaker, hopefully, for we all like company in our
misfortunes, and butcher nodded grimly. "The young noodle!" he said,
emptying his tankard.

Well, after that I kept my ears open, and it was the same story all over
the village. There was hardly a young man among all the ghosts of
Fairfield who didn't roll home in the small hours of the morning the
worse for liquor. I used to wake up in the night and hear them stumble
past my house, singing outrageous songs. The worst of it was that we
couldn't keep the scandal to ourselves, and the folk at Greenhill began
to talk of "sodden Fairfield" and taught their children to sing a song
about us:

S